2023 Volume 40 Issue 4 Pages 88-100
In the United States, an international submarine cable landing point, the involvement of an informal interagency organization called “Team Telecom” in the U.S. Federal Communications Commissionʼs (FCC) submarine cable landing license review has been a contentious matter. Team Telecom was abruptly formalized in 2020, and in response, the State Department also revised its involvement in the review in 2022, a move that will strengthen the review process like no other license reviews. This study attempted to elucidate the origin and development process of the Team Telecom review using FCC records to recapture the actual situation of the licensing process to ensure the predictability of future reviews. The results revealed the evolution of Team Telecomʼs screening process, which emerged and developed after the State Department-led screening framework became a formality, with the reviews of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). In line with the new institutional theory, the power of the State Departmentʼs institutional shift of “drift” and “conversion” was observed, along with changes in Team Telecomʼs review process. By capturing this new contemporary “executive branch involvement,” in which the State Department conducts a layered review after the Team Telecom review, we argue that there is likely to be greater uncertainty in the review process in future and that there will be a need to keep a close eye on the State Department.
